Write a persuasive letter to the Gulliver to stay in Liliput.
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Answer:
PART I. A VOYAGE TO LILLIPUT
CHAPTER I
[The author gives some account of himself and family. His first inducements to travel. He is
shipwrecked, and swims for his life. Gets safe on shore in the country of Lilliput; is made a prisoner,
and carried up the country.]
My father had a small estate in Nottinghamshire: I was the third of five sons. He sent me to
Emanuel College in Cambridge at fourteen years old, where I resided three years, and applied
myself close to my studies; but the charge of maintaining me, although I had a very scanty
allowance, being too great for a narrow fortune, I was bound apprentice to Mr. James Bates,
an eminent surgeon in London, with whom I continued four years. My father now and then
sending me small sums of money, I laid them out in learning navigation, and other parts of
the mathematics, useful to those who intend to travel, as I always believed it would be, some
time or other, my fortune to do. When I left Mr. Bates, I went down to my father: where, by
the assistance of him and my uncle John, and some other relations, I got forty pounds, and a
promise of thirty pounds a year to maintain me at Leyden: there I studied physic two years
and seven months, knowing it would be useful in long voyages.
Soon after my return from Leyden, I was recommended by my good master, Mr. Bates, to be
surgeon to the Swallow, Captain Abraham Pannel, commander; with whom I continued three
years and a half, making a voyage or two into the Levant, and some other parts. When I came
back I resolved to settle in London; to which Mr. Bates, my master, encouraged me, and by
him I was recommended to several patients. I took part of a small house in the Old Jewry;
and being advised to alter my condition, I married Mrs. Mary Burton, second daughter to Mr.
Edmund Burton, hosier, in Newgate-street.
But my good master Bates dying in two years after, and I having few friends, my business
began to fail; for my conscience would not suffer me to imitate the bad practice of too many
among my brethren. Having therefore consulted with my wife, and some of my acquaintance,
I determined to go again to sea. I was surgeon successively in two ships, and made several
voyages, for six years, to the East and West Indies, by which I got some addition to my
fortune. My hours of leisure I spent in reading the best authors, ancient and modern, being
always provided with a good number of books; and when I was ashore, in observing the
manners and dispositions of the people, as well as learning their language; wherein I had a
great facility, by the strength of my memory.
The last of these voyages not proving very fortunate, I grew weary of the sea, and intended to
stay at home with my wife and family. I removed from the Old Jewry to Fetter Lane, and
from thence to Wapping, hoping to get business among the sailors; but it would not turn to
account. After three years expectation that things would mend, I accepted an advantageous
offer from Captain William Prichard, master of the Antelope, who was making a voyage to
the South Sea. We set sail from Bristol, May 4, 1699, and our voyage was at first very
prosperous.
It would not be proper, for some reasons, to trouble the reader with the particulars of our
adventures in those seas; let it suffice to inform him, that in our passage from thence to the
East Indies, we were driven by a violent storm to the north-west of Van Diemen's Land. By
an observation, we found ourselves in the latitude of 30 degrees 2 minutes south